Our Story
As we begin our 10th year of ministry to all of the Virginia Tech community this Fall 2026, it is a good time to reflect on the roots that ground us and the waters from which we drink.
Over 25 years ago, several Virginia Tech faculty members began praying, studying, and discussing how they could provide meaningful ways for faculty, students, and staff to live out their Christian faith on campus. In 2011, seven of those members formally organized under the name Christian Scholars Network.
Over time, they recognized the need for a physical place to hold conversations, study the Bible, read important books impacting culture, pray, hold seminars on important topics, and stimulate the life of the mind even as they promoted genuine faith in Jesus.
Formal ministry began in 2017, and in 2019, our current building was purchased to advance the ministry.
Heavily influenced by the late Walter Bradley, himself a generational icon who did remarkable work integrating the Christian faith with academic life and who was a leading pioneer in the Intelligent Design movement, BSC’s founders named the new study center after him.
Today the Bradley Study Center is one of nearly 40 other Christian Study Centers around the nation and part of an expanding and influential movement whose umbrella organization is the Consortium of Christian Study Centers.
BSC is a bustling hub of activity that is in part modeled after the hospitality and incisive theological engagement of culture that marked Francis and Edith Schaeffer’s L’Abri in Switzerland. We extend warm hospitality, offering free coffee, food, and comfort to all who visit.
Another fundamental part of the BSC is the idea of the importance of theology to everyone, not just pastors or theologians. Influenced by the work of Regent College in Vancouver, British Columbia, we create opportunities for everyone in the campus community to think about how Christ makes a difference in every part of life, including every field of work and study.
One of our goals is to demonstrate that the Christian intellectual heritage that has shaped so much of our culture continues to serve as a valuable asset to life and to the future of the campus.
To date, the most thorough book on the history of the Christian Study Center Movement is “Thinking Christianly” by Charles Cotherman.
Providentially located just two blocks from the Alumni Mall entrance to Virginia Tech’s Blacksburg campus, at, appropriately, 104 Faculty Street, the Bradley Study Center seeks to fill the gap that is situated between the local church and the academic realm.
We offer ample and diverse opportunities for the entire Virginia Tech community to learn how to integrate their areas of learning specialties with a robust Christian faith that will, in turn, make Christian disciples through the integration of learning and faith.
